Managing decline?

419 libraries (339 buildings and 80 mobiles) currently under threat or closed/left council control since 1/4/11 out of c.4612 in the UK, complete list below. Librarian professional body CILIP forecasts 600 libraries under threat (inc. 20% of English libraries). The Public Libraries News figure is obtained from counting up all reports about public libraries in the media each day.

Arts Council England statement on libraries– Alan Gibbons. “Our key role will be advocacy for new partnerships and innovative approaches, particularly at local level” [This is worryingly close to the current code for encouraging volunteers to run otherwise closed libraries]. Arts Council aims to increase advocacy and stress central role of libraries in local life.

“Why did they illustrate this turgid and depessing document with pictures of libraries? I guess taking photos of a few books in the corner of a health centre might actually give the game away!” (Comment on Voices for the Library Facebook group on MLA report).

Campaigners critical over Government library blueprint – BookSeller. “…librarian group Voices for the Library have strongly criticised the report’s recommendations, saying they will do “serious damage to our public library network, and be counterproductive to efforts to modernise libraries and meet the needs of the UK public”. Libraries campaigner Desmond Clarke said it was “absolutely disgraceful” the report was “coming up with excuses to replace paid librarians with volunteers”, and that overall the report was “remarkably unimaginative.”

Life in Books: Janice Galloway – Guardian. “she records libraries as the sole bright spot of her university career: “I hid in the library more often than not, reading the starts of books to find which ones spoke back, developing a trust in the friendship of the well-ordered word I’ve never lost.”

Opinion: Public interest needs protection in deals to privatise libraries – Mercury News (USA). Privatising Santa Clarita libraries has cost taxpayer $12 million so far. Other examples include lower opening hours, less qualified staff. “Elsewhere in the nation, the Linden, N.J., library terminated its contract with LSSI after determining the town could offer the same level of services for $300,000 less. Fargo, N.D., also terminated LSSI’s contract after the company repeatedly requested budget increases and failed to pay bills on time.” .

Tintin and the value of libraries – JS Online (USA). “Libraries, like every other entity in the media and publishing worlds, are moving resources to the digital realm, and that’s how it must be. But never underestimate the value of a child being able to sit in a room and browse freely through as many books as she wants and take a few home to read anywhere. That will always be valuable, and I hope that libraries will always be able to provide that.”

Shirley Burnham on chief librarians

“…chief librarians are, indeed, advising councils that small community libraries should be closed, divested or otherwise wrecked. This is NOT a new thing, by the way. And they are still doing it ! Now, that’s not the whole profession, but it’s those at the top of it. Do hard-working library assistants and librarians agree with it ? No, they most likely don’t, but are gagged. I wish that even one individual in the SCL (The Society of Chief Librarians) who disapproves would speak up, that CILIP (The librarians’ professional body) would publicly condemn it,”a comment on The Good Library Blog.

“Notably, ours in Swindon in 2009 published a report recommending closure of 9 small libraries. Dorset campaigners are now facing the exact same thing, as are many others. I was on a ‘panel’ at an SCL conference once — never seen such a bunch of po-faced people. As friendly as vinegar ! They loved Vaizey, though with his Future Libraries [expletive deleted]. That lot, speak out ? Before hell freezes over ? I think not. But at least one of them ought to — and without delay.” in personal email, published with permission.

Women’s Institute “disappointed” by library report – BookSeller. ““The minister discusses balancing the changing needs of communities with budget pressures, yet beneath the promising rhetoric on innovation and creativity, this report paints a picture of a service under threat. Replacing trained staff with volunteers is a false economy,” Bond warned. “Volunteers have an important role to play but they are not a replacement for a professional service and we would welcome more detail on the evidence to support the claim that ‘local people want to play a more active role in running libraries’,” she said.

Local News

Bolton – Argument to close libraries is flawed say campaigners – Bolton News. ““Several of the objective criteria which the council said last February it would be using to make the decision, such as GCSE qualifications of local residents, were left out of the table altogether. Others, including the number of libraries within a 20 minute journey time, were given double weighting without any reasoned justification. “It leaves the council open to the accusation that the figures were rigged to obtain a preordained result.”

Oxfordshire – 1000 people respond to library cuts in two months – Henley Standard. Campaigners push for public to respond to consultation, using chance to put comments in (not just ticking boxes). ““Sonning Common library has not been saved. Although the council has promised to keep the library open, it is proposing to cut our professional staff hours from 25 a week to eight and substitute professional staff with volunteers.” Councillor says “we have got the core service saved and that is the main thing”.

Wakefield – Hope for library as fight continues – Wakefield Express. ““We’re now looking at sustaining a library service in the area rather than saving it. We talked about getting new organisations interested in using it as a base, like charities who might want to base outreach workers there for example. It has to have more than one use if it is to survive and if we can get some money behind us from some bigger organisations, we might even be able to build a much-needed new library eventually.”

This entry was posted by Ian Anstice on August 8, 2011 at 10:36 pm, and is filed under Uncategorized. Follow any responses to this post through RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

There are currently 3850 libraries in the UK (CIPFA figures for 2015/16). There were 4023 in 2013/14, 4482 in 2009/10 and 4622 in 2003/4.
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The complete list is on "Tally by Local Authority" page as are other changes to budgets such as cuts to hours, bookfund and staffing. CIpfa have calculated that 121 service points lost in 2015/16, 106 service points were lost in 2014/15, 49 were lost in 2013/14, 74 were lost in 2012/13, 201 in 2011/12, 33 in 2010/11.
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For a list of new and refurbished buildings see this page,

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I would also like to add at this point my thanks to Shirley Burnham for her frequent emails with relevant public libraries news which I then use as a a large part of the material for this site.

Warren O'Donoghue of Rabbitdigital Design has been wonderful in designing and creating this website, maintaining it and basically being there for the one hundred and one web problems that seem to surface all the time.